A woman has the right to ask her mother-in-law to leave her house

I was forced to make this post after I read in the forum the story of one woman, which stated as follows:

“I have been married to my husband for six years but for three years now,am now regretting my marriage. It all started the day I politely asked my mother-in-law with a clear conscience when she would be going back to the village when she had already stayed six months in what she made us believe was only a visit at the beginning. She became angry and said I had no right to question her when to come and go from her son’s house,that that is how I made her son forget her and his siblings since we got married with a lot of other abuses. Since then,she is the one now cooking for her son,washing his clothes and discussing office issues with him when he comes back from work. My husband no longer has time for me and our two children(a boy and girl) as he practically spends every bit of his free time with his mum. It has been like this for three years now and am no longer finding it funny and my mother-in-law is still not showing any sign of leaving yet and my husband and I never had planned of her coming to live with us…”

If you can control the rush of emotions, you will easily agree with me that a woman has right to tell her mother-in-law to leave her marital home. We can do that to our own parents if they become a pain. Yeah! We can all say: “Mama, prepare to go home. You have stayed too long with us’. The woman can do it to her own mother who has overstayed. The man can do it to his own mother who has overstayed. In fact, the man can do it to his mother-in-law who has overstayed, hopefully not in a rude or direct manner. Now, tell me why the woman cannot do it to her mother-in-law.

There are only two reasons why it is hard for a woman to do it to her mother-in-law. The first reason is cultural. The Nigerian culture (which is not an excuse) believes that the wife is also somehow a visitor, that the house belongs to the man more than it belongs to the woman. Therefore, it seems odd for one visitor to order another visitor out. Consistent with that culture, they think that the man’s mother is closer to the man than his wife is to him. This leads to the further fallacy of believing that the house belongs more to the husband’s mother than to the wife.

But this is not the law. The wife has greater rights in the house than the mother-in-law. The wife is not a visitor, but the mother-in-law is a visitor. Let’s just get one thing right: The man and his wife have equal rights in the house. Others derive their rights from the husband and wife jointly. So, your wife can ask your mother to leave.

The second reason is economic. If the wife is unemployed and has no income of her own, she is practically a slave. She will not be able to exercise her right to ask her mother-in-law to leave. She will be too scared to do so because she herself is a dependent.

We must deal with the two issues. First, nobody forces you to marry. So, as you choose a wife, understand that she has the right to ask your mother to leave. So, look for a woman so kind she won’t throw your mother into the rain. And please explain to your mother in very clear terms like this:

“Dear Mama, I love you so much. I appreciate the fact that you bore me in your womb for 9 months and nourished me with your breast milk. You gave me life and cared for me. In fact, without you, I will not exist. I owe my life to you. But, Mama, as you know, there was a time I could not survive without your breast milk, but there came a time when I had to leave your breast milk in order to continue to survive. Likewise, time has come for me to find a wife. And once I find my wife, my future and my life will now depend on her just as my life depended on you when I was young. So, Mama, my wife, not you, will be responsible to run my life henceforth”.

Tell your mother this in your native language. If your mother understands this, she will not come to try to run your home in place of your wife.

And please build or rent a separate home for your parents and your parents-in-law. Make sure the home of your parents and that of your parents-in-law are comfortable and they enjoy the same standard of living. Once I’ve done that, they must allow my wife to run our own home without their interference.

On the economic angle, don’t get married without being employed. Having your own source of income is more important than getting married. The worst thing you can do to yourself is to try to depend on your husband’s income. And those women who depend on their husband’s income will grow old to depend on their son’s income. They are the ones likely to hijack the home of their daughter-in-law.

I end by saying this: You do have the legal right to throw your mother-in-law out. But if you really love your husband, you must respect the woman that breast-fed him. She is actually the woman you took over from in the business of caring for that man.  A man needs to depend on a woman throughout his life. When he was young, that woman was his mother and when he is grown up, that woman is his wife. So, the two women should be friends and should respect each other. What should bind them together is the fact that they dedicated their lives to caring for the same man at different stages in his life.

If you treat your mother-in-law right, she may give you some information about your husband that will help you know how to run your home better. If you need advice on how to manage your husband better, do not go to your mother because your mother doesn’t know your husband better than you do. The person you go to is your mother-in-law. She knows how she managed the monster you just discovered in your husband. For you, the bad things you just discovered about your husband came as a surprise. But to your mother-in-law, that is his nature. So, befriend your mother-in-law and you will enjoy your marriage.